


A Single Feather

by qwanderer



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Misunderstandings, Nesting, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-30
Updated: 2020-01-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:33:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22471108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: Here's the thing. Demons must be good at improv, at hiding reactions, at carrying on no matter what. They can’t show a moment of vulnerability, not to each other, and certainly not to angels. They were supposed to be tough, untrusting, paranoid bastards, or else.So Crowley had developed a highly honed skill of automatically bullshitting, boasting, and mocking while covering up his true emotions, and it was in full force now.“Who for? Come on, it can’t be any of those bloody archangels, they're all far too full of themselves, the wankers.”
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 62
Kudos: 989
Collections: Good Omens Complete





	A Single Feather

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Nesting](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20181415) by [Elphen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elphen/pseuds/Elphen). 



> This is inspired by a lot of nesting fic and prompts in the fandom, but especially Nesting by Elphen, because I reacted strongly to it - specifically by going “Noo, Crowley, go into the shop even though there’s a feather, come on” and then wondering how many ways it could still go wrong in one evening.

Crowley had caught himself nesting, from time to time. Collecting books, or art objects, or furnishings. Running a shed feather through his fingers and finding himself drawn to placing it somewhere prominent. 

But he couldn’t let himself give in to too many of those impulses. He was a demon, and demons didn’t form real attachments. He would be punished if the Lords of Hell suspected.

And, more importantly, he was a demon, so his angel would never reciprocate. 

They could be friends, maybe even flirt a little from time to time, but nesting? An angel would never. Could never. Not with a demon.

There were moments when Crowley wondered if the formation of the bookshop had anything to do with those instincts, but there was never any other signs that the angel was nesting, or that he was so inclined with anyone, and Aziraphale seemed quite content to inhabit the place himself, and enjoyed the books and other objects therein enough to justify the whole collection.

No, it wasn’t a nest. It couldn’t be.

Because if Aziraphale ever did nest, it wouldn’t be for him, and the thought of Aziraphale nesting for anyone else was too unbearable to contemplate.

The bookshop changed slowly, as a rule. Crowley noticed some of the changes Adam had made when he’d brought the place back, just little things, because it was so rarely that new little things like that appeared. 

But then, perhaps a week after the damp squib of an Armageddon, Crowley came into the shop to pick Aziraphale up for dinner, and found that there had been further, sweeping changes.

Nothing drastic. Just a piece of furniture moved here, some dust cleared away there, a long-standing stack of assorted papers tidied away from this place or that. The windows cleaned, the more threadbare lampshades freshened up. An extra lamp in one place or another to throw more light on one of the comfortable armchairs. 

Little things. But taken together, when it came to Aziraphale, it was fast.

Crowley wondered once more if this were a nest. 

But no, it wouldn’t be. This was all just a natural response to having his treasures abruptly taken away and even more abruptly brought back. Everything sorted and straightened and accounted for. Everything appreciated and taken care of.

“Did Adam miss anything when he brought the shop back?” Crowley asked. 

“No, everything’s perfectly in order,” Aziraphale said, beaming at Crowley. “Additions only. The boy’s done wonderfully. I must send him a note.”

Well, that was it, then, Crowley told himself with a certain amount of relief. Just an inventory, and a little sprucing up. Nothing that meant anything.

The next time they got together for food, Crowley invited himself back to the shop for drinks, as he’d done many times before. Aziraphale seemed a little hesitant, but eventually agreed, and Crowley chalked it up to the angel’s hesitance to associate with a demon, which usually waxed and waned, and even if they’d agreed that they were now on their own side, such an ingrained behavior couldn’t be overcome overnight. 

Crowley was halfway through the door of the shop when he saw it. 

There was a feather.

A single white feather, laying in plain sight, as if casually left there. Perfect and soft, too lovely for words. But angel feathers were no casual thing. 

Aziraphale was nesting. The shop was a nest. 

He'd already made the first step inside, trespassing on the ground that was meant for Aziraphale's nestmate. He shouldn't continue.

He shouldn’t, but, fuck it, he was a demon. If his angel… if Aziraphale was letting him in….

Crowley took another step inside.

That feather represented the end of everything he had here with Aziraphale, and the world as he knew it seemed to slip sideways as he tried to find solid footing in a world where Aziraphale had gone and nested with someone.

He slipped into panic mode, hands sweating as he realized where he was, what he was doing. Walking into Aziraphale’s nest. Pushing the issue when Aziraphale probably hadn’t wanted him here at all.

How did this feel more like the world ending than the Apocalypse ever had?

He needed to find something to talk about, but there was only one thing on his mind. It wasn’t something one talked about, Crowley knew, not unless one was among the parties directly involved.

He shouldn’t, but then, the whole Arrangement gave a vicious V-sign to angelic customs, in the first place. And then here he was, right where he really shouldn't have been. What was one more transgression?

“Nesting? Really?” he asked bluntly, surveying the newest changes to the shop.

Aziraphale went red at the mention of it.

Now that he'd started, Crowley was in the grips of a panic-induced momentum.

Here's the thing. Demons must be good at improv, at hiding reactions, at carrying on no matter what. They can’t show a moment of vulnerability, not to each other, and certainly not to angels. They were supposed to be tough, untrusting, paranoid bastards, or else.

So Crowley had developed a highly honed skill of automatically bullshitting, boasting, and mocking while covering up his true emotions, and it was in full force now.

“Who for? Come on, it can’t be any of those bloody archangels, they're all far too full of themselves, the wankers.”

“Of - of course not,” Aziraphale stuttered, looking indignant. He wrung his hands, eyes on Crowley.

Well, there was that, at least. Another Principality, maybe? An equal? Or even… it hurt to think, but his brain kept churning through the possibilities, and his mouth continued its automatic patter of covering fire.

“Look at it all,” he exclaimed, and he felt his mouth smile, although he didn’t feel anything of the sort. “Everything just so! It even smells nice! The shop has never smelled nice. Kept the humans out, you said. You’re not trying to get a human  _ in _ now, are you?" Crowley wiggled his eyebrows, all the while feeling faintly ill.

Aziraphale's expression drooped further with each word. "Really, you don’t have to mock me. I know by now that I’m being ridiculous." 

His voice hitched on the last phrase, turning fragile.

That brought Crowley up short. He looked at Aziraphale, really looked, for the first time since entering the… nest. 

Nesting should have been an exciting thing, a thing that would make Aziraphale happy, no matter how much Crowley wished he could pretend that it wasn't happening, or that it wasn't important. 

Aziraphale wasn’t happy. He’d put on a bit of bluster, tried not to show it, but when Crowley let himself look closer, there were tears in his eyes.

_ Shit, shit, shit.  _

Crowley mentally threw on the brakes and tried to figure out the quickest way to backtrack. He’d been distracted by the sight of that feather, by the longing it awoke in him, longing he'd been used to carrying, but that suddenly burned him when faced with the prospect of Aziraphale nesting for someone. 

But his angel was hurt, and that was more important than being cool about this, more important than protecting his own feelings.

“You’re not ridiculous,” Crowley tried. “I’m sure…”

“You’re sure of what?” The angel was in the middle of a rather wet snit, alternately sniffling and snapping at Crowley.

Crowley should never have come in.

"Who could refuse you, angel?" he tried, softly.

Aziraphale's face crumpled strangely, and he took a hitching breath, mouth open to speak for some time before he actually managed it. 

“I don’t understand what you’re trying to do. How can you say that after acting…" Aziraphale waved his arms vaguely at the door. "...like that when you came in?”

Crowley sputtered. He gestured at Aziraphale with incoherent emphasis. “I’m just. I’m trying! I’m trying to tell you that you’re a catch, all right?”

The sound that Aziraphale made then was perilously close to a sob. “Why are you being this way?” he snapped, as if being sharp would counteract the vulnerability that noise had revealed. “If you don’t…” There was a breath, and then another, a marginally steadier one. “Then get out, and leave me in peace!”

Oh.

Right, then. That had done it.

Crowley raised his hands in surrender, and backed towards the door. “I… okay. Okay. I messed up. I shouldn’t have mocked. But you know me, I have to poke fun at things.”

“Not this!” Aziraphale objected fiercely.

“Okay. Not this. Noted.” Crowley bit his lip, wanting more than anything to make this right. He’d been hurt, and he’d overreacted. But. “I didn’t… I really didn’t think you’d take it so hard.”

Aziraphale made another one of those noises, a cry of pain hid under bluster. “How, pray tell, did you think I would ‘take it’?” he asked.

Helplessly, Crowley said, “Just… I wasn’t trying to be mean.”

"Well, it certainly can’t have been an attempt to let me down easy!"

"I… what?" 

The meaning behind those words had made a soft but definite impact, like an egg had been smashed into the top of his head, and the result was slowly trickling its way into Crowley's consciousness.

Crowley had to sit down.

He landed heavily on a convenient ottoman that was startled to find itself suddenly so close to the front of the shop.

"I thought you were leaving," Aziraphale said with a certain amount of bitterness.

“Oh, oh fuck. ‘Ziraphale. You were. I.” Crowley’s mouth open and shut, but he couldn’t dislodge the words in his throat. 

Aziraphale’s eyes were suddenly on him squarely, sharp and interested. “What.” It was a question, although Aziraphale had managed to stop it from sounding like one to any but the most carefully listening ears. “You didn’t think I was serious?”

“It was…” Crowley pushed the words out, because he had to know for certain. “It was for me?”

The room was suddenly terribly, echoingly silent. Crowley could hear himself breathe, it was almost deafening in his ears, and he wondered if he ought to stop. 

But then Aziraphale took a breath, and Crowley’s attention was fully on him again.

Aziraphale sounded as if he wanted to be annoyed when he said, “Well, who else in this blasted universe would it be for?” but instead he sounded breathless, like he’d just hit the ground with a solid thump and had the wind knocked out of him. 

“Someone…” Crowley cleared his throat, to get the thickness out of his voice. “Someone who’s not a demon?”

A breath passed through Aziraphale’s lips, one which couldn’t quite decide whether it wanted to be words or not. Then he shook his head.

“I suppose I deserved that,” he murmured, “after what I said when the world was ending.” He was quiet for a moment, and then he sighed. “I was so afraid, my dear. So afraid to cross boundaries and reach for what I wanted. I’m less afraid now. And for good or for ill, the only person I want is a demon.”

He turned to look at Crowley with those earnest, sea-blue eyes. 

The silence in the room now was warm, but uncertain. Delicate, like a soap bubble. Crowley looked around as if the next part of the conversation would present itself somewhere in the warm clutter of the shop.

The feather was within arm’s reach.

Oh. It looked just as tempting as it had before, soft and fluffy. Only now, it didn’t represent an end. It looked more like… a beginning.

Crowley reached for it, not daring to breathe, watching Aziraphale as he moved.

Aziraphale sank to his knees on the floor himself, slowly, as if he were in a daze. His eyes glowed with intensity, gaze on Crowley’s outstretched hand.

He didn’t seem to object.

Hand shaking, Crowley’s fingertips met the downy base of the feather, just brushing it. 

“Oh,” said Aziraphale, a sweet, soft sigh.

That was a good noise. That was a much better noise than any of the previous ones Aziraphale had made tonight. 

Gently, still not breathing, Crowley lifted the feather from where it lay. He cradled it in his hands, staring at it with awe, like the incredibly precious thing it was.

“But I…” Crowley wondered if he were dreaming. “Are you sure?” he asked. 

“Oh, Crowley,” said Aziraphale. He looked at Crowley, at the feather, gaze darting about as if he were searching for something. 

Whatever he found was not, apparently, words, because instead of opening his mouth to answer, Aziraphale moved forward, still on his knees, into Crowley’s space and cupped Crowley’s hands with his own, pushing them together around the feather. 

“Ah,” Crowley said intelligently.

He let himself stroke the soft vanes of it with his thumbs, and then a drop of moisture fell onto the heel of his hand, and he started. It took him a moment to realize that he was crying. 

“My darling,” Aziraphale said. “Yes. It’s for you.” He pushed Crowley’s hands in towards his chest so that Crowley was cradling the feather against his heart, and then he pushed further into Crowley’s space so that his waist was bracketed by Crowley’s legs and their faces were so, so close.

Reaching up to take Crowley’s sunglasses off and brush the tears away from his cheeks, Aziraphale said softly, “Hello.”

Crowley made a sound, then, as if something inside him had just been roughly ripped free, and he let himself slump forward just a little, leaning into Aziraphale.

They were both shaking as their lips met, soft skin brushing and separating and brushing once more, and then Aziraphale’s hand skated up the side of Crowley’s neck and into his hair, and they were kissing in earnest, warm, comforting, alive presses to each other’s mouths. 

They didn’t let go of each other. Even when they stopped kissing, it was just to cling tighter. 

Crowley couldn’t help letting out a desperate little laugh. “Made a mess of that, didn’t I?” he asked.

Aziraphale’s hand combed through Crowley’s hair, soft and comforting, but when he spoke, it was to say, “Just a little bit of one, dearest.”

“Bastard,” Crowley said fondly, and nosed at Aziraphale’s neck, just because he could. He thumbed the feather again, still cradled in one hand.

Aziraphale hummed fondly and slipped his fingers around Crowley’s hand around the feather, curling tighter, as if to confirm again that his feather was exactly where he wanted it to be. “Will you come upstairs?” he asked. “I’d… rather like to show you the changes I’ve made to the flat, if you’re amenable. Particularly the bedroom.”

Crowley thought he might be discorporating, or possibly dreaming and about to wake up. The arm that was wrapped around Aziraphale’s waist tightened, and he made a soft noise, not wanting to leave this moment quite yet.

“Am I going too fast for you now, my dear?” Aziraphale asked, and it could have been a little tart, all things considered, but instead it was just warm and patient.

“...A bit,” Crowley admitted, voice muffled in the shoulder of Aziraphale’s coat.

“Not to worry,” his angel murmured. “We have all the time in the world.”

**Author's Note:**

> OMG it's got art! Lovely soft art! [Here!](https://virtualcarrot.tumblr.com/post/615802703546875904/i-read-the-loveliest-fic-called-a-single-feather) <3

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] A Single Feather](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25822714) by [Djapchan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Djapchan/pseuds/Djapchan)




End file.
